Lately I’ve been having fun exploring what can be done hooking with T-shirt strips. It’s a fun new tool to add to my creative toolbox. T-shirt rugs are easy to hook, the materials are cheaper, and most amazing and mind-blowing of all, they are MACHINE WASHABLE!

The Penny Rug shown above is very tough and durable, and as you see it above, it has already been through the washing machine, just to be sure!

T-Shirt Rainbow Mat, 8″x13″, Designed and hooked by Judy Taylor

There was just one more thing I needed to know, and that was whether I could hook the t-shirts on a linen backing, instead of cotton Monk’s Cloth. The rainbow mat above was hooked on pre-washed linen, and after hooking, put through the wash again, and it came through perfectly. That’s good to know, because linen is more durable and long lasting than cotton, so it’s great that we have the choice.

There are some minor differences when hooking with T-shirts. One thing is that you are limited to the colors you can find. T-shirts are very difficult to dye, even if you try Rit Dye, the colors aren’t strong and they come out in the wash. Fortunately, t-shirts come in a huge variety of colors, all we have to do is be creative with what we have available.

You will need one extra-large t-shirt to hook approximately one square foot of rug. So on the Penny Rug, I needed two black t-shirts to hook the background. Luckily, I was able to find two that were indistinguishable, but if they had been slightly different, I would have just gone for a variegated effect, just like I do with yarn. Then you can just cut up child-sized t-shirts for the pennies.

On the T-Shirt Turtle mat (below), I used one extra-large t-shirt for the background, and small shirts for the yellow and blue. You can hook with a t-shirt with a design on it (like silk screen), but not the kind of iron-on transfer design (but you can cut that part out and cut strips out of the blank areas.)

T-Shirt Turtle, 15.5″x16.75″ Designed and hooked by Judy Taylor

I made sure to pre-wash the rug cord for the binding, so it wouldn’t shrink in the wash, and I bound the edges with acrylic yarn. The best way to cut the strips is with a rotary cutter on a cutting mat (like they use for quilting), using a yardstick for a guide. For more info on how to hook with t-shirts, read this post.

Don’t forget that for every $50 you spend at Little House Rugs you will be entered to win the Antique Flower Rug (below, a $480 value!). If you spend $100, you will be entered twice, $150 three times, etc.

Antique Flower Rug, 33.5″x24.5″ Designed and hooked by Judy Taylor

For you Etsy lovers, I just wanted to let you know that in addition to some of my rugs and supplies, I have recently put up some of the hats, purses and scarves that I make on my Etsy site. If you come to see me in a booth, I always have a variety of garments and accessories that are knitted or felted, but they didn’t seem like something that should go on my website, which is mainly just rug hooking. So if you’re looking for fun and funky accessories or gifts, check out my Etsy shop! If you “favorite” the shop, you’ll be notified when new items are added.

This month’s Featured Rug is an expanded version of our Sheep Whimsy kit, hooked by Vee Cowell of Becket, MA. You can read all about it here. Do you have a rug you would like to see featured on Little House Rugs? Let me know! If your rug is featured, you will receive a free half-yard of linen or our recycled cotton rug hooking bag that says “FIBER is good for you!”

Blog subscribers can try their hand at the Sheep Whimsy kit for 20% off during the month of March. Click here to order!

It’s pretty quiet around the old homestead this time of the year. My next show isn’t until April, so it’s a good time to take stock and try new things.

As much as I love rug hooking, sometimes you just want to try something different. For the last few months, I’ve been experimenting, going outside my rug hooking roots to flex my creative muscles. Last summer, I tried hooking with T-shirts, adding a fun new twist to my craft. T-shirt rugs are a fun challenge, low cost for materials, and best of all, they’re machine washable!

T-Shirt Turtle, 15.5″x16.75″ Designed and hooked by Judy Taylor

Then I tried my hand at punch hooking, something I’d not tried since the sixth grade. A total blast!

Punched mat 14″x14″ Mixed yarn on cotton rug warp

And this month, I’ve been having fun with twined rugs. Kind of a rug weaving craft, a “warp” of cotton strips is wrapped over a special wooden frame or loom (below, left). Then strips of fabric, like sheets, are twined over the warp (below, right). So one strip is wrapped around one warp, and the other strip is wound around the next warp. In this way, you continue to twist the “weft” strips over each other, through the warp.

Picture it this way, instead of passing a weft strip through the warp, over and under each warp from one side of the rug to the other (like with regular weaving), two strips are wrapped around the warp, one strip at a time. The effect is a lot like braided rugs. As with most textile crafts, there is a lovely zen feeling when you twist the strips across the row, then go back the other way.

You start working from one end, then at some point you turn the frame over and work from the other end. Little by little, you keep on building until your rows meet somewhere in the middle. You pull the remaining strips through the weft strands to keep them in place and you’re done!

After twining with cotton sheets, I tried another rug using felted sweaters for the weft! I make lots of things out of felted sweaters (jackets, purses, hats, etc.) so I always have lots of scraps to use up. I warped the frame with acrylic yarn that time, so the whole thing would be washable.

Blog subscribers can get 20% off the Birds of a Feather design or custom kit for the month of February. Check out these ridiculously low prices here!

Antique Flower Rug, 33.5″x24.5″ Designed and hooked by Judy Taylor

And don’t forget that for every $50 you spend with Little House Rugs between now and November 25, 2018, you will be entered to win the Antique Flower Rug (a $480 value!) (so if you spend $100, you’ll be entered twice, $150, three times, etc.)

Happy New Year everyone! It’s that time again, when we take stock, and gear ourselves up for what’s to come. A great time to regenerate with a creative endeavor, and what better time to get a rug project going?

Brementown Rug 23.5″x31″ Designed and hooked by Judy Taylor

The Brementown Rug is one of our most popular designs. Whether you start with the pattern on linen and empty out your leftover bags, or want me to put together a kit for you, it’s an easy and fun design to start off your year. Blog subscribers can get this design (pattern on linen, custom kit or the hand-hooked rug) for 20% off for the month of January. Click here to order!

This month’s Featured Rug is from Gabrielle Hall of Portland, Oregon. Click here to read her story.

Do you have a rug you would like to see featured on Little House Rugs? Email me! It can be a rug you’ve made, inherited, or found. Every rug has a story and we love to read all about them! If your rug is featured, you will receive your choice of a free half-yard of linen or our recycled cotton totebag that says “FIBER is good for you!”

Antique Flower Rug, 33.5″x24.5″ Designed and hooked by Judy Taylor

Don’t forget that for every $50 you spend between now and November 25, 2018, you will be entered to win the Antique Flower Rug (a $480 value!). If you spend $100, you will be entered twice, $150, you’ll be entered three times, etc.

Not yet a blog subscriber? It’s oh so easy to do, just click on the Follow button at the lower-right hand corner of your screen. What? The darned button has disappeared already? (Someone who is much smarter than me needs to explain why wordpress thinks that’s a good idea, but I digress…) If you are inclined to subscribe but the Follow button has absconded with itself, just close the post and navigate back to it again, then grab that sneaky Follow button before it scampers.

The blog goes out once a month, and will be delivered straight to your very own email account. It’s chock full of interesting tips and techniques, web specials, and upcoming shows and classes.

But wait, back to that first paragraph. 20% off EVERYTHING on the website? Surely you jest. 20% off custom kits, books, linen and frames? Yes indeedy. 20% off hand-hooked rugs and custom rug hooking? Yup. But only for blog subscribers until December 31, 2017. If you do decide to stock up, you need to let me know, either on the Notes to the Seller section of your checkout form, or in an email, that you are indeed one of the very most special of special customers, and your account will be refunded 20% of your purchase!

I’ve had quite a few customers ask me if our new Delovely Frame would work for punch hooking, and I’ve had to answer that I didn’t know because I don’t do punch hooking. Well, that was easy enough to remedy; I ordered a cute little trivet kit from Wooly Walkers.

The kit was a blast to do, the punch needle was easy to master. And the answer to the question is yes, the frame does work for punch hooking! You do need the extra set of clamps, but I found the Delovely held the backing just as tight as any embroidery hoop would do. But the real question was whether the clamps would hold as well over hooked areas and non-hooked areas, so to find out, I expanded the design to make it more pillow-sized.

Here you can see that the lower clamp is covering an area that is already hooked, but the backing is plenty tight to allow me to keep on punching. So my conclusion is that you can definitely use the Delovely Frame for punching! This could be really handy if you want to punch larger projects and don’t want to have to stretch the backing over a wooden frame. Now you can take your rug with you, and punch wherever.

Here’s the finished mat. Just for fun I punched with every type of yarn that I use for hooking, Ewenique, Jacob’s Pride, handspun, Halcyon Deco and Botanica (Halcyon Rug Wool wouldn’t fit in my #9 punch needle), Cascade Ecological, Peace Fleece and Heirloom Romney. They all worked just great.

Whale Rug 35″x26.5″ Designed and hooked with handspun Jacob wool by Judy Taylor

The Whale Rug was won by Melissa Rodgers of Clayton, CA. Congratulations, Melissa!

For every $50 that you spend at Little House Rugs between now and November 25, 2018, you will be entered to win the Antique Flower Rug, hooked with handspun and hand-dyed yarns (valued at $480!). (If you purchase $100, you will be entered twice, $150 three times, etc.) It’s my way of saying Thank You to all my lovely customers. Good luck!

Here’s a fun, quick ornament idea: hook a flock of sheep! These easy ornaments can be hung from a tree, or used as refrigerator magnets.

Draw ovals on burlap, with silly, cartoon faces.

Hook them in natural colors. For these samples, I used natural colored lopi (single ply) wool yarns. (If you need a quick primer on hooking with yarn, watch my DVD on youtube)

Cut out the hooked sheep, leaving 1/2″ of burlap all around.

With a needle and thread, tack down the remaining burlap, close to the hooked edge. Then trim the excess burlap away.

With a hot glue gun (or needle and thread) connect a 3″ pipe cleaner for the legs.

Glue (or sew) a 3″ piece of ribbon to the back.

Run a line of hot glue all around the edges and cover it with a piece of felt. Or sew the felt to the back of the ornament.

Trim the excess felt away from the back. You can also leave off the ribbon and glue on a magnet on the back instead, for a fridge flock of sheep!

This month’s Featured Rug is a Navajo design, hooked by Nancy Malitz.

3’x5′ Two Grey Hills Navajo design from a punch hook kit from the 1970’s

Read all about how she resurrected this old treasure and finished it here!

Whale Rug 35″x26.5″ Designed and hooked with handspun Jacob wool by Judy Taylor

Don’t forget, the drawing is coming up on November 25 to win this handspun, hand-hooked Whale Rug (a $450 value!). For every $50 you spend with Little House Rugs between now and Nov. 25, you will be entered to win. And now is a great time to stock up because blog subscribers will get 20% off EVERYTHING ON THE WEBSITE (including Custom Rug Hooking and Custom Kits) until the end of the year. (But you’ll only add to your entries to win the rug until Nov. 25, so Christmas shopping anyone?)

If you want to get the 20% discount, you must include BLOG SUBSCRIBER in the Notes to the Seller on the checkout page. Then you will receive an immediate 20% rebate on your total order.

Not yet a blog subscriber? It’s easy to join. Just click the Follow button on the lower right hand corner of your screen. (If the Follow button disappears, close the post and navigate your way back in. For some reason that is beyond me, the Follow button goes away sometimes…)

First, I have a FREE Beginning Rug Hooking Class on October 29 at the Rockwood Library in Portland, OR. As expected, this class filled up almost as soon as they opened registration, but don’t despair; the last class I taught at the library had six no-shows, so it’s a really good idea to get on the waiting list and to put the event on your calendar, so if you aren’t one of the ones who dove in as soon as it was posted, you may still get to join in this free class! Here’s the link to register: https://multcolib.org/events/beginning-rug-hooking/77600#block-simple-registration-client-register

I have two other beginner’s classes at the Columbia Gorge Fiber Festival in The Dalles, OR, October 27 and 28. The one on the 27th is a class where students will learn to hook with both yarn and wool fabric strips.

Scottie, 10″x10″ Designed and hooked by Judy Taylor This is the kit for my 2017 Beginning Rug Hooking classes, including both yarn and fabric strips so students get to practice both techniques.

And for a crazy new twist in rug hooking, you can try this one; hooking with t-shirt strips! You hook with t-shirts exactly the same way you hook with yarn, so it’s another fun tool to add to your rug hooking! This class will be held on October 28. You can register here: http://columbiagorgefiberfestival.com/product/t-shirt-rugs/

And if you can’t make it to any of those events, why not join me in my booth at Fiber Fusion at the Evergreen State Fairgrounds in Monroe, WA (http://www.fiberfusion.net/)?